Email 50 - "I Love This Ward!"

 

 

Hey family!! 

First off, happy birthday to B-radster and Nana! I hope it was stupendous. It sure sounds like it was :) 

It sounds like things are going swimmingly out there in Utah, which makes me happy :) Keep sending me updates! I love hearing all of the details :) 

We´ve had another busy week over here in Las Palmas! D---a´s baptism was moved up for the 13th of July, F----o has been getting more and more into the story of Lehi and whips out notes everytime he animatedly (did I make that word up? we use the word "ánimo" a lot here, and I can´t think of an exact translation...) tells us about what he read. And I´m loving the older couple we visit, L--a and R-----o, more than ever. I don´t know if I´ve told you about them, but they can´t come to the chapel for health reasons, so we stop by every now and then to chat and see how they´re doing. They´re HILARIOUS. We finally introduced them to the Elders the other day to share the love, and now they´re the district favorite :) They´re just a very humble, sarcastic, loving, intelligent couple that I can´t get enough of. 

And this week we´ve basically gone back to being in the Young Women program, haha. We are ALWAYS with the Young Women. And I can´t even tell you how awesome it is to be teaching 4 investigators  within that program in an area where the YW are so strong. It´s the best. 

We´ve been spending tons of time with them this week, and we were with them almost all day on Saturday after receiving special permission to accompany our investigators to an activity up on a mountain. Aaaand we´re going to teach them how to make American brownies on Friday :) 

We´re seeing major blessings from spending all of this time with the girls. Not only have Hna Irigoyen and I been gaining some major cool-points with the youth, but now they all want to go with us to our appointments, our investigators are bonding beautifully, and they´re all taking the need to share the Gospel more seriously. 

N-----a´s fast progress can definitely be attributed to the Roka family and the YW program. She´s still not set on a date, but she LOVES being with us and has made a lot of friends at church. I´ve even been teaching her how to follow the music in the hymnbooks and find the pitches to sing so she feels more comfortable when we all sing together. ...And now she never wants to meet anywhere where there isn´t a piano available to practice, haha. 

K------e and P---a are doing awesome, too. They´d been falling through on us for a couple of weeks, but this week they invited us over 4 times, and they´d read from the Book of Mormon together between each visit! We have a goal with them to read everyday for 21 consecutive days :) 

A--a is the 15-yr-old sister of our cute convert, A----a. She recently told Willy Roka that, having seen the baptism of her sister, she thinks she´s going to be baptized after the EFY she´s going to in a few weeks. We were finally able to start teaching her, and I´m excited about the progress we´re seeing already.  Pretty neat, huh? And we can´t even take credit for ANY of it!!! I love this ward! This is how it should be! 

Anyway, I´ve been a lot more pensive as we´ve spent time with all of these teenagers because it makes me think a lot about how my testimony was founded during my time in YW. I got the new Ensign that Mom sent (thank you!!!) and I LOVE the talk, "Becoming Perfect in Christ." 

As I´ve been thinking about all of the things I should have done better as a teenager, I was being pretty hard on myself, but I´ve learned a lot from Elder Gong´s quote in this talk: 

"Fully accepting our Savior´s Atonement can increase our faith and give us courage to let go of constraining expectations that we are somehow required to be or make things perfect. Black-and-white thinking says everything is either perfect or hopelessly flawed. But we can gratefully accept, as God´s sons and daughters, that we are His greatest handiwork, even though we are still a work in progress." 

Things can get crazy and we can mix priorities and we can get confused about what doing our best really means- but if we take a break and give Heavenly Father a chance to teach us, He´ll show us what He expects of us, and give us the means we need to improve and feel the perfect love He has for us. 

I love you all!! We´re all not perfect, but I know Heavenly Father´s pleased with our efforts! 

I miss you tons. Hearing details about everything going on over there has been awesome- keep it up please!! ´Looking forward to seeing photos of my best buddy´s WEDDING tomorrow!!! 

Have a blast! 

Love, 

Hna Grover 

Photos: Hna Irigoyen deciding that PB isn´t all it´s cracked up to be, and the YW activity!

Email 49 - "Life is Good"

Mike got into the animation program!!!!!!! The Gospel of Christ is being restored, our family´s getting a whole lotta in-laws sealed to it in a few days, Spain has a new king, and Las Palmas won it´s fútbol game last night!

Life is good.

Thank you for the birthday package!!! It got here the night before my birthday, so we were able to pick it up that morning- perfect timing.

We had a good day, too. As you´ve seen on Hna Larsen´s blog, that blessed woman made me an apple pie, and we all spent medio día together at a Chinese buffet. :)

So this was Hermana Caballero´s last week, and finishing up a very well-served mission was pretty rough for her. I´ve been running into the effects of her solid example throughout my whole mission (she left Gijón just a couple of transfers before I headed up there), and I was really lucky to get to learn from her personally this transfer. Understandably, the members, and our district, were all very sad to see her go. And now she´s with her family!

Aside from her parting, this week was another great one. Here are the updates:

F----o- Doing pretty awesome. Even though he´s had a hard time understanding the Book of Mormon stories, he´s been starting to get really into the story of Lehi (he can´t BELIEVE the tradgedy of Laman and Lemuel. With every chapter he reads, he tells us that he´s convinced they´ll change and follow their father. I´m pretty sure that´s one of the main reasons he keeps reading- he´s so curious about what´ll happen with them. Love it.)

Y----a- She was an investigator of the Elders, until she explained to them that she was more comfortable with the Sisters. Yep. That was awkward. But now we´re teaching her, and this 21-yr-old mother of 3 is progressing extremely well. She wants to understand everything that we teach perfectly. I´m pretty sure she´d heard the Plan of Salvation lesson 4 times before she asked us to go over it again, haha.

N-----a- This girl is doing so, so awesome. We have so much fun with her, and all of the Young Women just love her to pieces. The Young Women program is incredible here, actually, they´re all so close, and they all come bear-hug me everytime I walk into the chapel :D I´m going to teach them how to make brownies in a couple of weeks (shhhh, it´s actually cake, but after tasting it at a baptism, they all called it brownies, and they don´t know the difference, haha.)

Anyway, N--i has a baptismal date for the 19th of this next month, and she´s going to talk it over with her Heavenly and Earthly parents before our next lesson and we´ll see what everybody thought about it. :)

D---a- Our next cute little 8-yr-old investigator has a date set for the 27th of July. She´s doing great.

Oh, and yesterday was awesome. The Spirit was definitely the one directing the show all day long, and that´s a feeling I just can´t get enough of.

We saw M---a J--é, a sweet less-active, and a lot of little things just fell beautifully into place to make our lesson a very tender, spritual experience. We basically spent the whole time talking about her father-daughter relationship with God and making specific promises that came to mind as we read scriptures. It was beautiful.  I´ve been worried about her, too, so I was really grateful for that boost of a lesson last night. She´s been struggling with priorities, and had been feeling out of control of a lot of the tough situations in her life.

We´ve actually been seeing a lot of wacky priorities lately. We ate with a member this week who told me after the meal that the only reason she hasn´t gone to the temple to be sealed as a family with her new-member husband and 8-yr-old son is because she likes wearing immodest clothes too much.

I´m grateful that I was able to gain a testimony of dressing modestly as a little kid, because by the time I was preparing to go to the temple, there weren´t any second thoughts- and there certainly weren´t any second thoughts about giving up styles of clothing for eternal blessings. 

My companions and I found ourselves studying about things like this during the week. Hermana Caballero shared this scripture, and I think it´s going to end up on the wall in every and any future home I have:

2 Nephi 9:51-52

51 Wherefore, do not spend money for that which is of no worth, nor your labor for that which cannot satisfy. Hearken diligently unto me, and remember the words which I have spoken; and come unto the Holy One of Israel, and feast upon that which perisheth not, neither can be corrupted, and let your soul delight in fatness.

52 Behold, my beloved brethren, remember the words of your God; pray unto him continually by day, and give thanks unto his holy name by night. Let your hearts rejoice.

And I found this quote that I´ve been looking for from Sister Reeves:

“It is okay if the house is a mess and the children are still in their pajamas and some responsibilities are left undone. The only things that really need to be accomplished in the home are daily scripture study and prayer and weekly family home evening.”

Let´s keep our priorities in order, family!! I want to make it back to Heavenly Father, and I want you all there with me :) I sure love you tons, and I´m so glad we´re on track. That´s a blessing that not many families have.

I´m excited to hear absolutely everything about Mike and Alicia´s wedding next week. The power of Godliness is gonna be manifest during the ceremony, and I want to feel it when I read about how it went! ;) Enjoy every second!!! I´ll be thinking about all of you!

Love you tooooonnns!

-Hna Grover

Email 48 - "Three Moments I Will Never Forget"

Andrea's Baptism!

Setting up and conducting the Plan of Salvation Activity

"Check out this shot Hna P sent me this morning! That's our investigator, Richard, and SUNNY BAPTIZED HIM! So much happiness :D"

"The Larsens brought us lunch during activity prep :)"

"American cookies! Made with Spanish ingredients, but they turned out okay :)"

Hello family!

So I guess this Sunday was Father's Day, right? Happy Father's Day, Dad!! :) And THANK YOU, Brodricks, for the envelope full of love and happiness that got to my apartment this week. That was AWESOME. 

This week wiped us all out. For the last few days, we've been waking up each morning feeling like we've only slept for about 5 minutes, haha. It's been such an awesome week!!

For starters, we spent a morning with our one-legged buddy, P--o, cleaning his house, and that was super fun. He's a really sweet, humble guy whose brother just got arrested, so he's completely alone. The members have really been helping out a lot, calling him and checking up on him, and trying to get him ready to receive the priesthood :)

We also had zone training this week, and the Elders from the south of the island (including Elder Poulson from my ward at BYU) came up, and then we had a conference call on a webcam with a companionship from two other islands (we're all together today at the Larsens' house again, playing ping pong and eating yummy food). That was pretty awesome. 

The 4 things we focused on were the basic needs we, and our investigators have: 1. to be loved 2. to be trusted 3. to be understood, 4. to be appreciated.

We're already noticing a difference in our lessons as we've been keeping those things in mind. Especially with F----o, who's progressing again and working on getting his answer.  And we FINALLY got a Conference Ensign! :D

Now for the good stuff. Three moments I will never forget:

1. Andrea's baptism on Friday was a spiritual Thanksgiving feast, folks. She is so, so adorable, and knows exactly why she needed to be baptized. Her whole family came, and they were all very touched by the Spirit, even her mom's tough-guy boyfriend, Y--i, told us afterwards that he was feeling something special.

The Primary sang and gave short talks, we taught about the need to be like little children, and Andrea's testimony at the end was precious. The best part, though, was Andrea's smile when she came up out of the water. So, so happy, so pure, and so full of the Holy Ghost. 

2. And remember N-----a? She came to the baptism, and as we were socializing with everyone after the service, I went over to talk to her and D----e. When I got over there, I asked what she thought, and D----e blurted out, "She wants to get baptized!!" I looked at her, and she nodded. We talked about how she's been reading and praying, and what she's been doing to receive an answer. I asked her, "So you've gotten your answer?" And she just gave me a big, long hug, and cried. 

3. We spent all day in the chapel on Saturday with the Elders, setting up everything for our activity. It was very fun, occasionally stressful, and very, very worth it. What basically happened was this:

-everyone started in the airplane, where we had a safety presentation (how to pray, haha) and everything, and then they watched the mormon message from Elder Nelson about his experience on a crashing plane.

-with flashing lights and us missionaries banging on stuff, we simulated a plane crash, and then I walked in, dressed in white, to explain what happened.

-We went through the Spirit World and the three kingdoms of glory, and a wave of the Spirit hit everyone as they walked into the "Celestial World," where everything was white, and we had a happy, eternal family sitting together. All of us missionaries agreed that the Spirit we felt after having seen the contrast of the lower kingdoms was surprisingly similar to the Spirit we feel in the temple. 

Like I said, we're in the "mission home" today, so I don't have a whole lot of time, we need to let everyone else get on to write home, too. But I hope you all have a taste of what an awesome week it's been.

It's crazy that this is the last week for Hna Caballero. She seriously never even mentions it, it's amazing. It comes up sometimes with the members, but she's completely chill about it. I realized this week that it's only because she's been giving her all for the last 18 months that she can be so relaxed about it all ending. I know I really need to step-up if I want to be the same way!!

Anyway, I love you guys tons :) I hope you all have another awesome week of summer. It sounds like Brad and Kate are keeping busy with some awesome things, and I've been praying all goes well with the wedding prep and animation application for Mike! (Write to me! And send me sketches!)

I LOVE YOU!!!!

Love,

HCL :)

Email 47 - Very Sunny, With a Chance of International Tourists!

"Dinner with a family in the ward :)"

"Picture of a picture of our P-day in Tenerife :)"

"That´s N-----a in the middle, and her friend D----e on the right :) LOVE these two!"

Hey family!! ´Glad to hear that summer vacation´s off to a good start :) Thanks, as always, for the awesome photos!! I´m hoping everything´s still going smoothly with Mike´s animation application, and I´m glad things turned out as well as they did with the interview Dad had with the General Authorities- that´s so intense!

We´ve been very busy this week. It´s been very sunny, and tourists from all over the place are showing up with their big city maps and confused expressions, haha (I laugh... but that´ll be us when we come back to visit someday!). We always try to lend a hand with directions when we hear English :)

We´re also hustling to plan our activity we´ve got this Saturday, with two goals in mind: 1. Get ALL the members to invite a friend and/or less-active, and 2. Make the Plan of Salvation as real as possible. We´re doing an activity that every here seems familiar with, where we "simulate" a plane crash and then guide everyone through the Plan of Salvation. ´Should be pretty awesome if we can pull it off.

In other news, we ate with an Argentinian family this week, and after the meal, they asked us what we thought it was we´d just eaten. After answering "chicken," they told us it was rabbit. Haha. It was very, very tasty.

Anyway, I guess we scared C------e and P---a a little with the baptismal date, and F----o misinterpreted a comment from Hermana Caballero at church yesterday and got offended, so all three of them have asked us to set aside their baptismal dates. That´s been a very humbling experience for our trio, but we´re definitely learning a lot from it! I guess maybe we´ve been pushing things a little hard because we all have Hna C´s rapidly approaching release date in mind, so now we´re really trying to be more sensitive to the Spirit as we plan lessons and set baptismal goals. We´re definitely going to take things slower with these three for now.

A few weeks ago, we had a really neat mutual with the Young Women where we challenged them to all write a short list of friends/family members with whom they´d like to share the Gospel. The challenge is to pray specifically for them each day for 21 days, and the promise is that at least one of them will be prepared to receive the Gospel. The idea was taken originally from a talk by R.E. Wells of the 70, and it´s come to be known as the "member missionary covenant," here in the mission.

Anyway, one of the girls, D----e, has been praying for her friend, N-----a, and in the last 8 days, she´s come to church twice and we´ve had two AWESOME lessons with her!!! (editor:  see photo above)

The Gospel seems to become so pure, simple and so perfect as we teach kids. N-----a is 12, and she understands the importance of what we´re teaching her like almost no other investigator I´ve ever taught. We continue teaching 8-yr-old A----a (whose baptism is this Friday!), and although she was a little stubborn about leaving coffee at first (She´s 8, and addicted to coffee...), she´s been doing great!

We had an incredible consejo del barrio (ward council) this week, and the bishop told us that a new chapel for Las Palmas is on the way!! He said that we need to jump from an attendance of about 130 to 200, and he gave us a game plan. He said that every organization was going to give each of the missionary companionships 5 families to visit a month, to see if they´ll accept visits from HTs/VTs or the ward leaders. I´m STOKED. There are 327 inactive members in Relief Society alone, and we´re going to get them coming to church again.

So as we´ve started with some of these less-active families, we´ve been focusing a lot on the importance of the sacrament. With every appointment we´ve had, the sacrament´s been becoming much more significant for me, too. Almost everytime, I share this quote from a few conferences ago from Sister Reeves:

"Why does the Savior put so much importance upon the sacrament, dear sisters? What importance does this weekly renewal of our baptismal covenants play in our lives? Do we recognize the ability of the Savior to completely cleanse us every week as we worthily and thoughtfully partake of the sacrament? 

President Boyd K. Packer has testified, “That is the promise of the gospel of Jesus Christ and the Atonement: … that at the end of [our lives, we] can go through the veil having repented of [our] sins and having been washed clean through the blood of Christ.”

We began reading the Book of Mormon with M---a J--é, one of these less-actives, and she was surprised to hear that the family of Lehi lived 600 years before Christ. "They prophesied about the Messiah 600 years before He came??" That gave us a perfect opportunity to testify of the importance of the Atonement for every single one of God´s children, its infinite and eternal nature, and of the blessing it is to be able to apply it more fully each week with the sacrament. :)

I also had an interesting opportunity to talk about Mike´s mission with a recent convert we´re working with named A--x. He asked to meet with us, and told us his plans to leave the church for a time to investigate the Buddhist religion and the Asian culture in general. We taught him about his covenants for a while, and then the Spirit told me to take out the photo I carry in my scriptures of our family in front of the church in Thailand. I testified of the work Mike was doing over there, and the importance of the Gospel for every single one of God´s children. It was a really interesting, and a really spiritual lesson.  A--x left with the same intentions to investigate Buddhism, but I know we gave him something to think about.

Anyway, our trio is still doing great. Hna C´s headed home in TWO WEEKS which is crazy, but she´s still working as hard as ever! I don´t think I´m ever going to stop learning from these two...

Sorry this was such a sporadic email, but I love you guys so much!!!! I hope you all have a great week :) Keep sending me updates on everything!

Love,

Hna Grover

PS- Now that my companions have discovered my recording device, for better or for worst, everything is being recorded, haha. 

Email 46 - "Don't worry, be happy; God will bless you!"

 That´s me in paradise!

 All the Sisters at the conference :)

After a group shot at the Conference, I snapped one shot, and then it turned into what you see in the following photos, haha, just everyone snapping pics in every direction. Just another reminder that missionaries are a bunch of teenagers, haha. I got some pretty fun shots :)

 In Tenerife, we were planning on staying with the Sisters there... and then President called and said he´d gotten us all hotel rooms! Those two days felt much more like a vacation than they were probably intended to, haha...

Eating at the Roca´s (our recently released ward mission leader- solid family), and, to be honest, I sometimes think that 18 (editor:  meaning, I think, 18-years-old for young men to begin serving missions) was maybe a little too early... haha

A----a :)

We were drawing out the Gospel of Jesus Christ, and she put on the bottom, "June 21st, YES"

"Hello my family! Don´t worry, be happy, God will bless you!"

(That´s from the homeless guy who, from what the members say, is going on three years sitting near the chapel greeting members as they come to church.)

This was a week of miracles :)

Remember Y-----a? We showed up to their house the other day, and she was all smiles. After a few minutes, she finally burst out and told us that her boyfriend had proposed to her! They´re getting married!!! 

As we sat down with 8-yr-old A----a and taught about the Gospel of Jesus Christ, we set a baptismal date and she was thrilled to accept it and then run tell her mom.

Now, I´ve felt the Spirit when people have accepted baptismal dates before, but I´ve never felt it like I did with A----a. There were angels in the room, folks! A----a´s all set to be baptized on the 13th of this month, and the whole family (including Y-----a´s fiancé) are stoked to attend.

I haven´t told you about C------e and P---a, right? They´re the 13-yr-old and 15-yr-old little sisters of a YSA recent convert, J---é, who´s very, very protective of his little sisters. He used to tell us that we couldn´t set a baptismal date with them, because he felt like they weren´t ready. We´ve seen big changes with this family this week :)

His 18-yr-old brother, O---r, has made some big mistakes in his life. He was recently kicked out of school, has tattoos and gauges in his ears- but he´s had all of the lessons from the Elders (2 years ago), and we were surprised to find that he was willing to let us in the other day when his sisters weren´t home.

As we taught about the Savior, O---r would smirk and kind of laugh as we explained things, but anytime we asked him a direct question, it was amazing how clear it was how much he believes in what we're teaching, and how badly he wants it to be a part of his life. 

I´ve been reading in Doctrine and Covenants lately, and this verse made me think of him:

"And again, verily I say unto you, there was joy in heaven when [O---r] bowed to my scepter, and separated himself from the crafts of men." (D&C 106:6)

Long story short- he and his two sisters have baptismal dates for the 21st of this month! :)

F----o has been doing well, but we were confused when he didn´t show up for church this week. Technically, he could still be baptized on the 7th, but he´s suddenly not answering the phone. It´s only been a couple of days since we´ve seen him, but we´re still a little nervous. Prayers would be much appreciated :)

Elder Beuden and Elder Shumway had an incredible baptism this week- probably the most powerful service I´ve ever been to. A---n, their investigator, has accepted the Gospel and sacrificed his past life without a second thought. On the day of his confirmation, he was given the Aaronic Priesthood. During his baptism, "the power of Godliness" was most definitely manifest, as it has been each time we take a step closer, with our investigators, to the waters of baptism.

Oh, and that zone conference that we had in Tenerife was amazing. I loved being with the missionaries from all of the islands, I loved getting to see President Jackson (it´ll be a few months before I get to again. ´Nothing like when I was in Madrid!). I didn´t love the boat trip back to Las Palmas (we all got super sick, haha), but it was a cool couple of days.

During the conference, my comps and I sang a three-part harmony for "Nearer My God to Thee"... and I think I´m ready to not always be given musical number assignments, haha. It comes with being an Hermana, I guess. We pulled it off okay, though :)

Anyway, the whole conference was very focused on the Savior- how He taught, what His role is. With Him, Heavenly Father´s Plan of Salvation is perfect. Without Him, it´s worthless.

As I´ve seen people making major changes this week, and as I´ve been working on some of the major changes I need to make, the Savior is becoming increasingly more important to me. I know without a doubt that my mission is worthless without Him, but worth every second with Him. 

I know He lives, and I know He´s trying to help me humble myself to become a better missionary. :) ´Definitely a work-in-progress!!

Anyway, we´re happy and our trio´s doing great. I hope you all have an awesome week :D As a district, we´re planning an activity where we´ll basically take everyone through the Plan of Salvation, and we´re going to have a family dressed in white at the end, talking about eternal families in the Celestial Kingdom. Like I said last week, that eternal perspective is what keeps our investigators going, and it´s what makes me tolerate being away from you all!

Love you tons!

-HCL :)